


America's drive-in

by stilltrying_tofigure_itout



Category: Utopia Falls (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, F/F, High School, Summer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-13
Updated: 2020-06-13
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:13:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24705133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stilltrying_tofigure_itout/pseuds/stilltrying_tofigure_itout
Summary: Sage isn't the best a round pretty girls. Ir's not her fault she gets flustered and doesn't know how to act. It's even worse when this pretty girl is a customer that she tries to explain how they make water too.
Relationships: Brooklyn 2/Sage 5 (Utopia Falls)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 69





	America's drive-in

Gran Riel says I’m lucky, I don’t believe her. What is lucky about spending multiple hours a day rushing between a too cold air-conditioned room and the heat of summer, carrying someone else’s deep-fried food, all while wearing a cotton t-shirt and long black pants. Plus, a visor, can’t forget the visor. I forgot it one day, I don’t recommend. As I was saying, I don’t call that lucky, I call that uncomfortable, and sweaty, very sweaty.

“Hello, thank you for choosing Sonic! What can I get for you?”

I cringe; I can hear the fake smile in Mag’s voice over the headset, but somehow the customer can’t. I tune out the order he takes and focus on the one in front of me. Who orders a single plain cheeseburger with extra mayonnaise? I’m gonna find out, unfortunately. It’s the mayonnaise that’s gross, if you are going to get a plain burger with a condiment please, for the love of god, do ketchup. Anything else and I will judge you.

I toss, sorry, place, the burger in a paper bag followed by fries, a mint, two napkins, and a few packets of ketchup. I pause before throwing a few packets of mayonnaise in as well. I put the bag down on a tray, snag their sprite zero, also gross, from the drink section and walk out the door.

The parking spot I’m headed to holds a huge black truck; I’m guess I’m going to be eye level with the window seal. I’m wrong. Once I get to the car, I notice I can stand beneath the review mirror. I tilt my head almost all the way back to see inside the truck, and even then, I can only see the inside roof. There’s country music playing, and not the kind I tolerate.

“Hello, I have a single plain cheese burger, extra mayonnaise,” I look up to make sure I have the customers attention and see a woman, probably in her fifties, with bleach blond hair, “Along with a side of fries and a large sprit zero. That sound good to you?” And I make fun of Mag’s customer voice, mine’s even worse.

“Yep, that’s mine,” She doesn’t have an accent which surprises me. I hand her the food and the drink, careful not to spill it, I am lifting it over my head, followed by a straw. She then sticks her hand out the window holding two dollars, I’m pleasantly surprised. Most people who pay with a card don’t tip, especially not with cash.

“Oh, thank you very much. Have a nice rest of your day.” I spin and walk across the parking lot back to the building, adjusting my visor as I go to free a stand of sweaty hair that had gotten stuck to my lips.

I stand by the fact that mayonnaise is disgusting and should never been the condiment of choice, much less a single condiment. But at least I got a tip out of it.

“All I’m saying is that we should bring roller blades back, think of how fast we could bring people their food,” Mags’ arms are gesturing wildly while Bohdi and I lean against a counter watching, “Plus, It’s classic, super retro.”

“Well I wouldn’t have to wear them considering I’m production, I’ll leave the roller blades to y’all,” Bohdi shrugs and Mags looks to me for my opinion.

“Yeah, no way in hell. It would not be fast; it would be mayhem. I mean just think of all the people that would run straight into cars or poles, I would probably be one of them,” I haven’t been roller blading in over five years, granted last time I went I picked it up relatively quickly, but Mags doesn’t need to know that.

“No, I have complete faith it you, you’re one of the most coordinated people I know. We could laugh at everyone else screwing up together,” Mags defends, and he’s probably right. Half the people that work here are super clumsy.

“Well regardless on whether we could do it, it’s too much of a safety concern, the managers would never go for it,” I instantly regret saying it because Mags immediately looks to find Chapter, the manager working today.

“Hey, Chapter,” He looks up and walks over to the three of us, leaving the drink station where he was cleaning.

“Roller blades,” Mags says once he’s in front of us, “What do you think? Can we bring them back?” Mags nudges Chapters shoulder and he leans back to distance himself.

“Not a chance,” Chapter says, and Mags faces falls as if he was expecting anything else, “What we can bring back is doing our job, don’t you guys have something to do?”

I immediately look around for something to clean and see a broom leaning against the wall not too far from me, I grab it and turn back towards Chapter, “Yep, I was about to start sweeping,”

“And I was about to restock the utensils and napkins,” I hear Bohdi say. I pause my new action of sweeping to see what Chapter assigns Mags to do, he always gets stuck with the worst tasks.

“Thank you Bohdi, Sage. Now Mags,” He turns to Mags and Mags looks around desperately.

“I was going to help Sage sweep,” He tries to say, but it’s a fruitless attempt.

“No, I’m pretty sure you were about to go change all the trashcans outside and restock the bathroom.”

Mags whines while I laugh at him, luckily Chapter ignores me.

“Here’s the keys to the closet for the toilet paper,” Chapter holds out his key chain and Mags reluctantly takes it, “Better get to it before the next rush.”

He then walks away, Bohdi and I laugh heartily at Mags as he mopes around, grabbing trash bags and large rolls of toilet paper.

“It’s your own fault dude, you didn’t have to call him over,” Bohdi says with no remorse, and the three of us continue about our new jobs.

“I’m annoyed, I’m thoroughly annoyed,” I can feel Mags rolling his eyes behind me, but I continue regardless, “Who comes to sonic to order water? Water! Nothing else.” If you can aggressively fill a Styrofoam cup with ice and water, I am doing it.

“If I heard correctly, it was ice water with a little lemon,” Mags says, and I know it’s for the sole purpose of annoying me, he succeeds.

“Oh, shut up. Let me complain in peace,” I walk over to him to grab a few slices of lemon to put in the cup.

“You know, I think I preferred it when you first started working here and you were a shy angel. You never told me to shut up back them.”

“Back them was three weeks ago,” I say unamused.

“Oh, you’ve grown up so quickly,” He reaches out like he’s going to ruffle my hair, but the visor gets in the way, so he settles for patting my head.

“Shut up,” I say again, I think it’s begun to lose its meaning, “You would die of boredom if I didn’t talk to you. Bohdi’s not a great conversationalist,” I say the last part louder so he can hear me from where he stands in front of the burgers he’s cooking.

“I’m a great conversationalist,” He calls over his shoulder, “I just also do my job,” He then looks over his shoulder at me and Mags leaning against the counter. Mags holding a recite he was about to put the order together and me holding a lemon water cup without a lid.

“Right, I should probably do that,” I snag a lid and push in on to the cup and walk out the door.

The person who ordered the water is parked the furthest away you can get, because if you’re gonna order a water, which costs nothing, why not make the workers spend the most time in the humid heat as possible. It’s a white jeep that occupies the spot, the roof off and windows taken off, and not one of those big shine jeeps, this one’s definitely on the smaller side. It’s not dingy, but definitely not shine. It looks like something someone could go mudding in but would clean off after.

As I approach, I recognize the music playing, Halsey. If they are listening to Halsey, they can’t be that bad, plus it’s one of my favorite songs by her playing, “killing boys”. I mentioned that being one of my favorite songs by her to Mags one time, he just said I’m gay so there’s no surprise there, he’s not wrong.

It’s a girl sitting in the driver’s seat, she looks about my age with dark brown hair that’s pulled back into a high ponytail showing her clear light brown skin.

“Good music taste,” I say, after all I can’t read her the order, its only water.

She visibly jumps, she had been scrolling on her phone and singing under her breath very good I might add.

“Shit,” she turns to me and scrambles to turn the volume down so she can speak at normal level, “I’m so sorry, I didn’t notice you were already here.”

She smiles widely at me and I find myself caught, wow she’s really pretty.

“Umm,” I shake my head slightly to clear my mind, “Yeah, I mean, it was just water,” I shrug and awkwardly hold the water out. I shouldn’t be this stiff, this is literally my job, “Didn’t take long to make.”

The girl continues to smile at me as she takes the water out of my hand, and instead of walking away like I should I continue to talk like an idiot.

“Not that we make water, we fill it up,” I pause, but don’t worry I don’t stop there, “In the sink, no wait, not the sink,” I rush to correct even though the girl had yet to respond to anything I’ve said, “We fill it up in the water…dispenser…faucet…thing.” I trail off, finally.

The girl continues to watch me, her smile having grown if possible. Again, instead of walking away like I should I just look at the ground, “What the fuck,” I mutter under my breath at my stupidity. Mags is never going to let me hear the end of this, because I am definitely going to tell him.

“Well,” The girl finally speaks, and my head shoots up to look at her. Self-pity aside she is really quite gorgeous and I’d be a fool not to look at her when she talks to me, “Thank you for the water from the water dispenser,” I cringe, shit I actually said the words ‘water dispenser’.

“Yeah, your welcome, and sorry,” I give an awkward smile, or let’s be honest everything I’ve done during this interaction had been awkward, “I should probably head back,” I gesture over my shoulder back to the building but make no move to leave.

“Wait,” The girl says acting like I was actually heading back to the building, “Here you go,” She holds a five dollar bill out the window.

I hesitantly grab it and look at her in confusion, “Five dollars for a free water?” This girl is acting as strangely as I am apparently.

“Five dollars for the hassle of making me a water,” She winks at me when she says ‘making’ and I instantly want to jump off a bridge, “I know it’s stupid to come to Sonic for a water, but I just went for a run at the park, “She gestures down the road Sonic is off of in the direction of a nearby park, “and I forgot my water bottle. Kinda felt like I was gonna pass out from dehydration.” The girl continues to smile at me, and I rush for something to say.

“That would be unfortunate,” yes that is seriously my response, not ‘well I hope that helps’ or ‘well stop by anytime’ like a normal person would when talking to a pretty girl. I settle for ‘unfortunate’ like an idiot.

The girl bites her bottom lip and I watch the action as her lips stretch into another smile regardless of the action, “Unfortunate indeed,” she gives up the attempt to hide her smile, which I notice because I am still staring at her lips, “Well, I should probably let you get back to work.”

My eyes widen at the mention of work, right that’s what I’m supposed to be doing right now, “Shit yeah,” I cringe at cussing in front of a customer, definitely not supposed to do that, “I should probably go.”

“I’ll see you around,” She says.

“Yeah,” I respond, but I don’t know what she means. ‘see me around’? I have no idea who this girl is, I would remember her if I had met her before. Where is she planning on seeing me?

“Um, bye,” I finally turn around and walk away. I don’t look both ways when crossing the parking lot so honestly, it’s a miracle I don’t get run over and embarrass myself even more. Before I enter the building, I glance back at the jeep, I can’t see the girl anymore because her chair blocks my view. Probably a good thing because if I made eye contact again, I would walk right into the glass door.

Once I enter the building Mags turns to me, “That took you forever, it was just a cup of water.”

“It wasn’t just a cup of water,” I say, and I look around to make sure a rush hasn’t come while I was outside, we’re clear, “It was also the most embarrassing experience of my life.”

Mags perks up at that and pulls me over so Bohdi can listen as well, “Well don’t make us wait for the story.”

Mags doesn’t work the next day, but Aliyah does, which means I get to watch her and Bohdi flirt.

“Not good enough, you’re gonna have to step it up,” Bohdi says. Aliyah is standing beside him. He’s cooking the burgers while she’s preparing them. Apparently, she didn’t put the ketchup on correctly.

“Shut up, I’m doing great,” She laughs and continues what she was doing.

“You’re really not, you know there’s a protocol on how to do this right?” Bohdi finishes the last burger and steps closer to Aliyah under the presence of leaning against the counter she’s working on. I find his not so subtlety on getting closer amusing and I text Mags the update.

_To Mags:_

_Sage: Oh! Bohdi took a step closer, maybe we’re making progress_

_Mags: Please, it’ll be another week at least before anything happens, they don’t have the guts_

My headset goes off before I can respond, and I reach up to turn on my end.

“Thank you for choosing Sonic! How can I help you today?” I walk to the register to ring up the order.

I zone out during the lunch rush, Bohdi and Aliyah stop flirting long enough to help the rest of us. I spend most of the time taking orders and bagging them; I leave others to run them out to the car. It’s too hot for that today. At about one thirty it starts to die down.

“I hate summer,” Bohdi complains from where he stands in production.

“Really? Because I remember not five minutes ago you talking about how it’s your favorite season.” Apollo, another production worker, counters.

“It’s my favorite season, but definitely my least favorite work season.”

“I’m going to take offence to that,” Aliyah says at the same time I say, “Ouch.”

Aliyah only works during summer, and I had only started this summer.

“Well obviously I like it cause y’all work,” Bohdi says to both of us, although his eyes are only on Aliyah, “I’m just saying, at one on a Tuesday during the school year we would not have been that busy.”

“We’ll yeah, it’s summer, no one’s in school,” Aliyah says.

“I wish I wasn’t at work either,” I add which immediately makes everyone start pushing me around and teasing me.

“You know, just for that, you can take this out,” Aliyah hand’s me a small peanut butter shake she had been working on.

I accept the shake and walk to the door, calling over my shoulder before I leave, “Ok, but only because I don’t want to watch you and Bohdi flirt again.”

I look at which spot it goes to and see a familiar white jeep. As I walk to it, I can’t decide if I want it to be the same jeep or a look alike. Once I’m close enough to hear the music I’m 90% sure it’s the same girl. This time Billie Ellish is playing, “you should see me in a crown”. I slow down as I approach, trying to plan what to say, but she beats me to it.

“Hey! What are the odds?” Her hair’s down today, not sure how she pulled that off in a roofless jeep, but it looks pretty put together.

“Actually, pretty low, I basically got bullied into taking this order out,” I say not thinking anything of it until I see the girls face start to fall, “Not because of who I was bringing it to. I had no idea, no one did,” I rush to clarify, “I just said something, so they all yelled at me, then Aliyah pretty much pushed me out the door. Well not really she just handed me the shake,” And suddenly I remember the shake, “Which I have right here.”

I hold out the shake and the girl takes it. I can’t read her expression, but she doesn’t look disappointed like she had when I first started talking.

“And we actually did make this,” I continue talking for some reason, “Unlike the water, which we didn’t make. I made the shake. Well actually Aliyah made the shake, I was cleaning. So, I was doing my job, just not the shake making part of my job.”

You know those moment where you can hear the words coming out of your mouth, but you can’t stop them. They just keep falling no matter what you tell your brain. Apparently, that’s what my body decides to do around this girl. It’s not uncommon around pretty girls by any extent, but it’s usually not this bad.

I finally trail off after rambling about how we make shakes for a minute. I just stand there looking at the girl and tell myself to turn around and walk away. She paid with her card and I gave her the shake, there’s no other reason for me to be here. Unfortunately, my body and brain continue to fail to communicate and I’m left standing beside her car.

“Regardless of who made the shake, thank you.” The girl holds the shake in her right hand and her left arm rests on the window seal. I’m standing between the menu and her car, so her head has to be turned to look at me.

“Your welcome.”

Great now we’ve done the pleasantry, I can leave. I actually think my feet are about to move when the girl speaks again.

“So, do you not have to wear a nametag at Sonic?” I look down at me shirt even though I know I’m not wearing one, I’ve never worn one.

“Oh, we’re supposed to, but no one does,” I respond and look at the girl. Her smile slowly grows as she looks at me, and I shift on me feet unsure of how to continue.

“That was me trying to ask for your name,” The girl teases, at least I hope she’s teasing. If it’s not teasing, then she’s making fun of me. I’m going to go with teasing.

“Oh, right, sorry. It’s Sage,” I raise my hand a few inches planning on a handshake and almost immediately change my mind. What seventeen-year-old offers a handshake when meeting a pretty girl. Instead I try to play it off as messing with my visor, but all I succeed in doing is pulling the visor awkwardly low on my forehead. I push it back up to a normal height and can fell my hair form a bump at the top of my head. I should not be having this much trouble.

“Sage,” The girl repeats. Her tongue darts out to lick her lips and my eyes follow the action like last time. A second after her tongues disappeared again, I look back at her eyes. Her smirk tells me she caught me, but she doesn’t seem to mind.

“I’m Brooklyn, since I know you were going to ask,” She says after a pause.

“I was, going to ask,” I pause in the middle, I seem to be doing that a lot, but in my defense, you have not seen this girl. She takes pretty to a new level. “Um, nice to meet you Brooklyn,” I add after mentally flailing to something to say.

“Well I should probably get back to work, before they start thinking I ditched them,” I say, and it’s true, if I’m gone much longer, they are going to know something is up. But that doesn’t technically mean I want to stop talking to Brooklyn.

“Yeah, don’t let me get you in trouble,” Brooklyn says, and I turn to go expecting that to be the end of it, “Same time tomorrow?” She adds before I can take a step. Good thing to because I think I would have tripped over nothing.

“Um, I mean I don’t work tomorrow,” I say, but then realize she might not have been talk about me at all, “But, we’ll be open same time, so feel free-” She cuts me off before I can continue.

“Well when do you work next?” she’s smiling and looking at me expectantly, but I can’t seem to get a noise out.

I clear my throat and instantly hate myself for it, it’s such an obnoxious sound.

“Friday,” I say, and then proceed to clear my throat again when it comes out croaky, “Friday,” I say clearer.

“Friday,” She repeats, and I nod waiting for what she’s going to say next, “I think I’ll be in the mood for a milkshake then. Sounds good,” I nod, and she takes her eyes away, it might be the first time she’s done that, to pull out a cup holder and place her shake in it.

She looks back up and is about to start her car when she sees me in the corner of her vision, still standing there, like some crazy person. I think she’s about to change her mind about ever coming back when she instead covers the awkward moment.

“Same time?” She puts sunglasses on as she asks the question and I’m struck with the realization I know the color of her eyes without looking at them.

Then the question catches up to me, “No actually, I start at five.” I’m just going with the conversation now, it will catch up to me later.

“Good thing I asked then.”

I nod mutely and finally, finally begin to walk back to the building, “Bye Sage.” I hear called behind me and I raise my hand in a wave gesture but don’t turn around, to stuck in my head to really respond.

Like last time I look back at her jeep before I enter the building, this time I see her hands above the chair like she’s butting her hair up in a ponytail, that would explain how it wasn’t a tangled mess. I enter the building and after a moment Apollo notices I’m back.

“There you are, what took so long? You left me alone with these two,” he gestures to where Bohdi and Aliyah stand by the register. They’re touching at the side and talking quietly, occasionally one nudged the other in a good humor fashion.

“I didn’t leave you alone,” I tell Apollo and gesture to the other workers in today, most of whom I have yet to learn the names of.

Bohdi and Aliyah look over at the sound of my voice and walk over.

“What held you up? Costumer giving you trouble?” Aliyah asks once she next to me.

“No, it was someone I know, kind of,” I answer.

“Kind of?” Apollo questions.

“Yeah, I don’t really know her, just met her yesterday,” At that realization comes to Bohdi’s eyes.

“Oh, the girl you were talking to Mags and I about. Who was ‘so gorgeous I tried to tell her how we made water’?” Bohdi asks already knowing the answer.

“Yes, the same one,” I say over Aliyah and Apollo’s laughter, “and don’t worry this time I went in depth on how we make milkshakes.”

“And how did this girl respond to that?” Aliyah asks.

“By introducing herself and saying she’s coming back Friday night when I’m working,” I respond cockily, and I deserve to after embarrassing myself so much already.

“How the hell did you manage that?” Aliyah sounds impressed, and I am to. I didn’t do anything for it, but I’m not going to complain.

“I have no earthly clue.”

By the time Friday comes around I’ve convinced myself I dreamed the whole conversation. Mags is the only one working with me, so I’m hoping I can just take orders all night and not have to confront the fact Brooklyn is probably not going to show up. Unfortunately, our friends filled Mags in with what happened Tuesday almost immediately, so he knows all about it.

He spends the first hour we’re there trashing me about it.

“When you take an order out and don’t come back for thirty minutes, I’ll cover for you.”

“Maybe you should have a mint every few minutes, you never know what’s going to happen.”

“This time explain to her how we make the paper bags, follow your trend.”

After a while he dials it back on the jokes, not to be nice, just because he can’t think of anymore.

It’s busy, as expected from a Friday night mid-June. Mags takes orders while I bag them and make the drinks. I leave them for someone else to take out, I don’t feel like running around tonight. Around eight thirty the manager of the night, Watts, comes over to where I’m bagging up an order.

“Sage, you got here at five, correct?” I nod without looking up as I toss napkins and forks into the bag, I then slide it to the side and face him. “Great, how does break at nine sound?”

“Good, I’m fine with whenever,” I shrug, I’m a little hungry, but nothing pressing.

“Ok, once Michael gets back from his break you take yours,” I just nod in response and he leaves.

Beside me Mags finally has a break from taking orders, “I’ve already been here two and a half hours, I guess it being busy is a good thing.”

“Yeah, I mean this is the first time you’ve had a break since you got here,” I bag the order he had just taken and fall into pointless conversation with Mags about gross orders. After ten minutes of talking he signal to his headset saying he has another order and turns to the computer.

“Thank you for choosing Sonic. What can I get for you tonight?” I laugh at his bright voice as I always do. It’s so fake it’s incredible, “Yes, why?” He says and I tune him out.

I look over his shoulder at the screen and begin putting the order together, He laughs into the headset and I hope he muted it first, so he doesn’t get into trouble for being rude to a customer. Because of how long the order takes, regardless of how simple it is. I have it done as he’s reading off the final price.

He turns to me and I see him hide a smile as I fold the top of the bag over. The order only contained mozzarella sticks and a small vanilla shake. I look around for someone to run the bag out before realizing we’re short one since Michael’s on break.

“Just take it out yourself,” Mags says as soon as he’s done summiting the order.

“I don’t want to, I like it in here,” I complain even though I know I’m going to take it out.

“Don’t be such a baby,” He pushes me toward the door, and I start walking, “There you go,” He encourages, and I roll my eyes.

I walk outside as see the patio full, mostly with high school and college age kids. I finds the spot to take the order to and stop in my tracks when I see the car. If I had a headset on right now, I would cuss Mags out. It’s the white jeep. Brooklyn’s here.

“Shit,” I mutter under my breath as I continue forward. She’s parked in a different spot this time, the parking lots crowded so she had limited options.

Following the trend, she has music playing when I walk up. I recognize it, but I can place the name.

“What song is this? I can’t remember the name,” I say as a greeting, she sits up in her seat and turns to face me.

“That was fast, usually y’all take longer than that,” She smiles, and I know it’s not an insult. Her hairs mostly down today, but with some braids running down the right side of her head.

“Simple order,” I say as an explanation.

“What can I say, I don’t come here for the food however delicious it is,” I bite my bottom lip to tamper down my smile and avoid her eyes, “and it’s She by Hayley Kiyoko.”

“Right, I thought it was her, but I wasn’t sure,” I nod while continuing to avoid her eyes.

“So Sage,” She says my name for the sake of saying it, and I’m not going to complain, “How has your night been so far?”

“Pretty busy actually,” As I say it, I realize from this parking spot my co-workers can probably see me standing and talking. I glance over my shoulder and step closer to the car. I slide behind the menu, so it hides me from view. Brooklyn notices my movement at looks at me in confusion

“I just don’t want my manager to see me standing around,” I explain and Brooklyn shifts so she can see the building.

“I don’t want to get you in trouble, you can go back in,” She offers, but I find myself not wanting to.

“It’s fine, Mags said he would cover for me,” I reassure her, and notice afterwards that made it sound like I had been waiting for her all night.

She doesn’t comment on it, instead saying, “Mags? That’s who took my order, right?”

“Yeah, how’d you know that?” I question; he doesn’t usually say his name while taking orders.

“He introduced himself after I asked if you were working and said my name,” Brooklyn explains only looking slightly embarrassed for asking for me.

“So that’s how the first order I took out today happened to be yours,” I lean forward so I’m leaning against her car, hands prompted in the window seal.

“yeah, that must be it, whoops,” Brooklyn shrugs and smiles widely at me, I can’t help but return it, “So, you were talking to Mags about me,” Brooklyn brings back what I had earlier said about Mags covering for me.

“Actually, I think you were talking to my friends about you,” I avoid the accusation and focus on the fact she had asked for me.

“He seemed to know who I was,” She teases while I blush and look away, “Don’t worry,” She adds, “I’ve told all my friends about the pretty sonic worker who tries to teach me how to make water.”

My blush somehow increases, both at the compliment and the reminder of my failure to be chill around her.

“You make it sound worse than it was,” I mumble as a response.

“I took you fluster as a compliment, don’t worry,” She reassures, and I look at her again.

She’s fiddling with the hem of her shirt and keeps shifting in her seat, from sitting on one leg then both on the ground then back again. Her eyes are darting around my face while the constant smile remains on her face.

“Definitely a compliment,” I say, we lock eyes and I feel lighter than I have in a while. I get pulled out of it when a car pulls into the spot next to hers. I glance over my shoulder to glace at it but find myself looking at the menu. “Shit.”

“What?” Brooklyn leans forward confused as to why I cussed.

“I have to get back to work,” I had forgotten where I was, but I knew Mags could only cover for me for so long.

“Oh,” Brooklyn’s eyes fells, but she quickly picked them up, “Of course, don’t want you to get in trouble.” She falls back into her seat and smiles at me.

Before I can think about it, I start talking. “My break starts in like ten minutes,” She looks at me in surprise, “If you want to hang around until then. We could just chill?” I shrug like its not a big deal, but really my insides are trying to strangle me.

“Yeah, of course I’ll stay,” Brooklyn is smiling so widely I’m surprised she can speak through it.

“Great,” I take a step back, “See you in a bit,” I spin around and walk quickly across the patio.

I walk into the building and pass Watts, “Couldn’t have waited for your break to use the bathroom?” He questions and I’m confused for a moment before I realize that was Mags’ cover story. Original.

“No, I’m sorry. It was an emergence,” I apologize, and he looks at me. He just nods accepting it and I walk towards Mags.

“So you were out there for a while,” He says once I’m next to him.

“Yeah, thanks for the heads up,” I say sarcastically. Mags just shrugs with a ‘what can I do?’ expression on his face.

“If I told you it was her you would have found some way not to go out.”

I nod ruefully, “Unfortunately, you’re probably right.” I glance at the time on the screen, I probably have six or seven minutes until Michael’s back I go on break. My stomach starts to knot up at the thought. I just offered to hang out with Brooklyn for thirty minutes, why the hell did I do that?

Mags didn’t see my inner turbulent and continued with the conversation, “So how did it go? Did you get her number? What does she even look like? I haven’t seen her yet, just you described her.”

“I didn’t get her number,” before Mags can yell at me, I continue, “But I did just ask her to stay through my break.”

“Are you serious?” instead of waiting for me to respond he turns around and looks out the window in search of her car. He must see it and looks at me in shock. “Damn Sage, I didn’t know you had it in you.”

“I don’t,” I shake my head fiercely, “Mags what did I just do. Oh my god in five minutes I’m going to talk to her for thirty minutes.” I start to pace, and Mags does his best to calm me down.

“Relax, she’s probably nervous to. And if you want to leave at any point you can. Just get out of the car.”

“You’re right, I know you’re right. But that doesn’t mean I’m not freaking out.”

Mags looks at me guiltily and gestures to his headset saying he has an order to take. I just wave my hands to symbolize I’m good and he can take the order, but I’m sure I just succeed in looking for lost. I pace until Mags is free. He talks before I can.

“Sage, you need to calm down. This really isn’t that big of a deal.”

“It is though. I’m going to make a fool of myself.”

“Probably,” I turn on Mags and glare, but he continues, “But from what you’ve told me and everyone else, she thinks that’s cute for some reason. So really being a dork might help you.”

“You know what isn’t helping me? You.” I whip around and resume pacing.

“Ok, please stop pacing before Watts yells at us,” I glance over, and he hasn’t noticed me yet, but I still slow down. “Go make some ice cream so you have something to eat during break.”

I nod, that’s not a bad idea actually. I walk to the ice cream and make a hot fudge sundae then put Reece bits on top. I put the lid on and turn around in time to see Michael walk in.

“Sage, you can go on break now,” Watts calls from his desk and I shoot Mags a frantic look. He gives me two thumbs up and gestures towards the door. I go to the computer to break out, then walk out the door.

Once outside I take a deep breath and alternate the hand I hold my ice cream in to wipe my palms on my pant legs. I look at the white jeep and consider backing out, but the only other option now is to go to my car and sit there alone for thirty minutes. And that’s a hard pass.

I make my way across the patio to the jeep and go to the passenger side door. Brooklyn notices me immediately and smiles widely. She leans across the passenger seat and opens the door.

“Thanks,” I say quietly as I climb in, I pull the door closed behind me, not that it does much. The windows are out and the roof is off so at least it doesn’t fell confined.

“No problem,” She pauses, and I worry that this is about to fall into awkward silence, but she continues. “So, what do you have there? Your ice cream of choice?” She gestures to the sundae in my hands that I had forgotten I was holding.

“Oh yeah,” I let out a breath of laughter, “Hot fudge sundae with Reece bits.”

“Hmm, didn’t know that was an option.”

“Perk of working here I guess,” I shrug and find myself settling comfortably in the seat.

“Does that mean you can hook me up with one next time I come by?” I watch as Brooklyn folds one of her legs underneath her, so she turns to face me more.

“I can probably work something out,” I take a bite of my ice cream.

She smiles at me like there’s a secret between us before asking how working at Sonic is. The time passes quickly, we bounce from talking about work to school to music to sports. I find out she doesn’t have an official job, although she baby sits a lot regardless of her claim to not be good with kids. She goes to a private high school only fifteen minutes away they she says is filled with ignorant dich hicks. She’s trying to expand her music taste after listening to her parent’s music while they drove her until less than a year ago. She does cross country, which explains the run at the park, but she’s also involved in theater and choir at her school.

As my break draws to an end, I find myself turned around in the seat so my back in leaned against the dash and my legs are crossed in the seat. I’m in this position so I can choose music from Brooklyn’s Spotify without her seeing the songs I pick. Brooklyn is leaned towards the middle, her elbow propped against the center counsel to hold her head up.

Throughout the time I’ve found that Brooklyn is good at holding eye contact. She smiles widely and when she laughs her tongue pokes out of her mouth and she closes her eyes and leans her head back. She has a habit of running her hand through her hair, using her thumb and pinky to pull the sides back so her face remains clear.

While Brooklyn is mid story about the play her school put on last year my alarm starts going off. I fumble to turn it off, banging my head against the windshield in the process.

“Ouch,” I mutter, and I hold my head once the alarm is silenced.

“You okay,” Brooklyn asks with a worried expression on her face.

“Yeah fine, just clumsy,” I smile shyly at her.

“I thought dancers were supposed to be graceful?” Brooklyn teases and I laugh lightly.

“Apparently I didn’t catch the memo,” Brooklyn continues to smile at me, now she has her bottom lip between her teeth and I get distracted easily. “Umm, anyways, yeah, that was my alarm.”

“Yeah,” Brooklyn drags it out, so it ends up sounding more like a question, but her smile doesn’t fade.

“My alarm for my break,” I finish, “I got to go.”

“Oh,” Brooklyn’s face drops slightly, and she settles back in her seat.

“Yeah, but this was a lot of fun.” I pause and wonder how I should continue. Should I ask for her number? Her snapchat? Hell even her Instagram would be better than nothing. In the end I just open the passenger door and slide out.

I close the door and reach in to grab my now empty ice cream cup.

“Well I’m honored you spent your break with me,” Brooklyn says with a smile.

“I mean it was either this or sit alone in my car and do nothing,” I don’t notice how it sounds until Brooklyn’s smile drops slightly, and she looks away. Then my eyes widen and I rush to fix it. “I didn’t mean it like that. This was a lot of fun. Definitely my best break I’ve had. I want to do it again.” Okay maybe that was too far. “But only if you want to. I mean, no pressure, like you don’t have to, but if you want to.” I fumble with my words for a few more seconds before Brooklyn cuts me off.

“I had a good time too Sage,” She says with a smile.

“Ok good,” I take a deep breath and glace at my phone. Shit, I’m going to be late. “I’m sorry but I really got to go.” I gesture helplessly to the building before turning to walk away.

I only make it a few steps before Brooklyn calls me to wait. I turn around to see her getting out of the car and walking toward me. I smile despite myself, maybe she’s going to ask for my number.

“I forgot to give you your tip,” She says instead and holds out her hand in which I see a couple crumpled bills.

“Oh,” My face falls, but I try to cover it with a smile. “Thanks, but that’s really not necessary, letting me hangout with you during my break was enough.” I didn’t want to accept her money, it felt like she was paying me to spend time with her.

“No, I insist.” Brooklyn doesn’t seem to catch onto my change of mood and instead just holds the money out further.

“Well, thanks.” I take the money and shove it into my pocket before offering her a tight smile. She replies with a wide smile, although there is slight confusion in her eyes as she looks from me to my pocket. “Have a nice night,” I say, then turn and walk back into the building.

After clocking in and putting the rest on my uniform on I look put the window to see her car gone.

“So, how’d it go?” Mags asks as he comes to stand beside me.

“Really well,” I confess, “Until the end when she tipped me. As if she was paying me to spend time with her.”

Mags flinches a little before trying to turn my mood around, “Did you at least get her number?”

“Nope,” I walk to the drink station and get back to work.

Through out the rest of the night Mags tries to talk to me about it, but I do my best to avoid him. It’s not until I’m off work and home that my mood turns around.

I’m counting my tips to put away when I pull Brooklyn’s out. I quickly notice a phone number written in bright red letters across one of the bills and smile to myself.

I reach across my bed for my phone and quickly add her contact. I open the messages and stare at the screen for five minutes before finally summoning the courage to text her.

_Sage: you know it’s illegal to deface currency, right?_

I hit send and look at the screen for a few seconds before setting the phone down. It’s past midnight, the chances that she will respond tonight are miniscule. I resume counting my money, although much more distracted now. I rush to open my phone every time it vibrates, or I think it vibrates.

Eventually I leave to brush my teeth and prepare for bed. Once I return, I look at my phone, and this time I see a response.

_Brooklyn: yes_

_Brooklyn: but it gave you a great conversation started didn’t it_

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know if ya'll want a second part


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